The CPRE parse Boles
It seems that the Campaign to Protect Rural England does not share Nick Herbert’s benign interpretation of what the minister said. The West Sussex County Times reports:
A ‘huge solar farm’ could be built in the South Downs if national parks were made to promote economic growth, warned the Sussex-Horsham district chair of the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE).
The chair, Dr Roger Smith, said: “Even under the present regulations, the South Downs is subject to the threat of a huge solar farm development.
“This is the kind of development that could be pushed through if National Parks were given a duty to promote economic growth.”
Tree Health Survey
Parsing the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government
Nick Herbert has told the West Sussex County Times :
We are not going to see house building all over the South Downs National Park, and the Minister [Nick Boles] did not say that there should be a relaxation of planning controls in parks, as press reports implied. He said that the parks should not become museums, and I agree with him about that.
I also agree with what the minister said about the need to express localism more fully in parks. I have always warned about the democratic deficit in national parks, which was reflected in the controversy over the South Downs National Park’s decision over to allow a travellers site at Crossbush.
It was the backbench MP who moved the debate [Simon Hart] who suggested that the duty to conserve parks should no longer be given primacy over the duty to secure economic well-being. The minister did not endorse this view, and it is not Government policy.
Mansions of the Soul
The Shoreham Herald reports:
A painting designed for an Upper Beeding church more than 30 years ago has finally been hung on permanent display there.
The late Margaret Nethercoat-Bryant, a renowned artist in the village, painted the large triptych for St Peter’s Church, in Church Lane, in the late 1970s or early 80s.